VERNACULAR BUILDINGS RESEARCH HENLEY ARCHAEOLOGICAL & HISTORICAL GROUP

Parish/County: Henley-on-Thames, Oxon Owner: Municipal Charities Leased by: Facy’s until 2011 Street and House name: 25 Market Place Recorder: Ruth Gibson Date of visits: 13.9.10, 27.1.11 5.12.14 (by E.H.& Dendro work)

Listing grade and entry text: Gd II, ‘ for group value. C18th facade. Red brick with shallow pitched, slate roof. 3 storeys, 3 windows of which centre is blank. Cased frame, sashes with slightly cambered heads and glazing bars. Ground floor altered C19th shop front’

The above Listing entry is clearly wrong on many counts. English Heritage is in the process of updating this as the building’s early timber framed structure has been discovered and dated.

NB On 10.12.2014 two bays of the rear range roof timbers have produced a dendro date of 1471. The entire Listing Entry has been changed accordingly by Historic England on 2.4.2015.

No27 No 25

No 25 Market Place, shop front facing north, Rear ranges: single storey brick and flint brick shallow pitch and slate roof. The 1st floor central former stables or workshops. window and two top floor The tall, white gable is the 5-bay, C15th range ones are false windows. Rear roof of street range is steep and tiled.

Known History: Owned by William Barnaby and left in his will to the town in 1585 for the upkeep of the bridge and the poor of the town. Documented as part of the town’s charities in 1835 (A.Cottingham p.194/198, ‘The Hostelries of Henley’ identified it as The Rose & Crown at No 27 Market Place, but the correct house number is No. 25). The ownership of No. 25 is still with the Municipal Charities, who continue to use the income from it for charitable purposes as intended by the wealthy Elizabethan donor. According to Cottingham its use as a P.H. is only documented between 1751 and c.1788; its name however, suggests that its use as an inn or public house may date from Tudor times. Its brick front, sash windows and shallow slate roof indicate alterations or rebuilding early in the C19th . This would fit an advertisement by the Town Clerk for the sale of a 33 year repairing lease in 1835, which suggests the construction of a shop front, part removal of the passageway, the digging of a cellar and the building of 2 attics.

Errol Facy’s grandfather leased the building from the Municipal Charities in 1896 for £ 50 p.a. The lease of the shop ceased in 2011,that of the flat above ceased a year earlier. The ground floor shop was in use as a ladies’ fashion outlet; the first floor and attic were used as accommodation by the Facy family until recently.

1 Date of 1st map, type of plot: The 1878 1st O.S. map shows a building abutting the south side of Market Place, with carriage way on the east side. The plot runs back to the parish boundary between Henley and Rotherfield Greys and could well have been of the length of 429 feet advertised in the Particulars of 1835 (see above, A.Cottingham).

Plan form/position in street: The front range consists of two bays, built parallel to the street of single pile depth with a long rear range attached at right angles. This two storey-range, consisting of 5 timber framed bays, adjoins the westernmost front bay and accommodates a first floor staircase in Bay V (see schematic plan below). These stairs and landing connect and serve both rear and front ranges, although they are of different floor levels indicating different building dates.

Beyond the timber framed two storey section to the south is a single storey building, brick with some timber framing, which is part of the shop and also storage area. All other out-buildings, glass house and substantial gardens, shown on the OS map have made room for the car park.

Description of the building: The principal street range is occupied by the shop front at g.f. level, which is a through shop extending into the rear wing from which all early features have been removed.

The red brickwork of the wall is laid in Flemish bond with flat brick arches over the windows. There are 3 sash windows (two 8 x 8 window panes, one 4 x 4 ) at the first floor and 3 at the attic floor (4 x 4). However, the central first floor and two attic windows are false. They would have been put in simply to give the front elevation the all important symmetry of a typical Georgian façade. The front roof was raised to allow for head height in the attic. It is covered with Welsh slates. However, at the back the roof retains its original steep pitch and is clay tiled.

At first floor level the false central window also shows that it was put into an earlier building, as it abuts an existing, timber framed cross wall, the latter still indicated by the uneven plaster work of the bedroom walls. The ceiling in bedroom east is c. 3 feet higher than that in b.r. west.

The attic: This is reached via a landing and turned staircase inserted into part of Bay V of the rear wing, which connects the different levels of the front and rear ranges. Mr. Errol Facy recalls this staircase rising originally directly from the shop floor.

West, front attic room with small cast iron bedroom fireplace, a typical Victorian, mass produced example with register plate and decorative garlands incorporated in the front face.

Only the west bay of the attic has been converted into a useable bedroom; it has the only real window of the three attic ones shown externally, as well as a fireplace. The east bay is blocked off by the central truss of the original roof structure and is now only accessible through a small hatch in the wattle, daub & plaster wall. This now blocks this formerly open, arch braced truss. Most of the elements of the original roof structure of the east bay survive below the later roof timbers inserted above it, to allow for the increased height of the front brick wall.

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New rafters

new

roof

support Blocked

window

queen strut

Raised front brick wall with blocked window The old roof structure retains its original trusses and all supporting the new rafters for the shallower rafters at the south/rear; those on the north/front have slate roof. Underneath are the old roof been removed, but the original purlin is still in place, timbers with one surviving wind brace supporting new timbers for the new roof above. between purlin and principal rafter The original truss (centre back) seems mostly intact with two raking queen struts between tie and collar.

Central truss. Just visible is the north arch brace, which rises from the northern principal rafter to the cambered collar. There is another arch brace on the south side, but barely visible in this photograph. The front purlin is clasped (?) and its dimensions are 7” x 5”. The collar dimensions are 7” x 4”, the arch brace is 6”x 2”. Chamfers ?

This was very probably an open truss, but it is not possible to see whether it has a tie beam, as the floor level of this attic space has been raised by circa three feet and the original fabric in the dividing wall below is not visible, but uneven enough to indicate timber framing.

3 Rear wing: At ground floor shop level no early features are visible; the rear wall of the front range has been removed, creating an open through shop.

At first floor level four timber framed bays of between 2 m and 2,70 m length survive. The fifth bay (V on plan) houses the C19th staircase and landing and little of the original framing remains. In the 1st floor bays some of the wall posts with their jowl heads are visible supporting tie beams. Curved wind braces are visible in Bays I and II, which have high ceilings inserted at collar/wall plate levels. The dividing cross wall at Truss D, between Bays III and IV, consists of later studs replacing an earlier timber stud wall, the tenons of which can still be seen in the soffit of the tie beam.

Left: Bay I, south west corner with curved wind brace.

Right: Stud wall of truss D. A long raking strut is typical of C18th work, further indicating a later alteration to this dividing wall.

The attic is divided into 5 timber-framed bays of irregular lengths. It has a side purlin roof with tusk tenons jointed into the principal rafters and supported by struts, collars or braces. Each of the visible trusses is of a different design, as shown below. The timbers in trusses C, D & E have been dendro dated to 1471.

North side of closed Truss C Truss D with western queen post clasping Ceilings of bays 2 & 1 beyond are the purlin; also note groove in the back of this raised to collar level. There are raking post, indicating a previously closed truss wi nd braces throughout the roof. with wattles & daub infill .

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Truss E, south side, looking north into the later inserted stair well and landing of Bay V. Truss E has two long, slightly curved braces, lap jointed to form a scissor brace, which would have created an elegant open hall roof, possibly together with the missing end truss at F. Originally this elegant truss would have been visible from the floor of the chamber below or may be even from the ground floor.

Left: Detail of scissor brace and principal rafter clasping the purlin with a tusk tenon

Right: View of the lower part of Truss E showing the end of the scissor brace tenoned into the front face of the principal rafter held by only three pegs just above the springing of the wide, curved wind braces.

Truss E has a rare and rather elegant scissor brace truss, where two identical long, slender braces with a slight curve at the top rise from the principal rafters. They are halved and lap jointed across each other and pegged into the opposite principals close to the apex. Their soffits are chamfered and they were clearly meant to be seen to impress. They also show some slights signs of sooting, but it is not enough nor ingrained to say that this is the truss of a former open hall, more likely it is due to escaping smoke from the adjoining Bay 3, which shows a great deal of sooting.

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Truss D, above, looking south into Bay 3 from Bay 4. Curved, raking queen struts support the purlins. The central, tall stud below the high collar is slightly off-set allowing free access into bay 3, it is part of the original truss construction.

Below is a close-up of the high collar and off-set stud, seen from inside Bay 3, looking north, making a doorway.

Note the smoke blackened lath and plaster panel right and in close-up in the photo below right.

On both sides in Bay 3 the tops of two rafters have been cut away to create an opening. This together with the smoke blackening and original access ( via

ladder ?) from the adjoin- st ing 1 floor level of Bay 4 indicates that it was a smoke loft used for preserving victuals; smoking meat such as bacon was often done in bacon lofts. Hop drying may be another possible

use for an inn.

Truss C has two queen struts from tie to collar with additional studs supporting laths for the plasterwork of the raised ceilings seen in the first floor rooms of Bays I and II below. The farther roof space above Bays I & II was not accessible for investigation, but

6 the tie beams of trusses A and B are exposed in the rooms below, as are the curved wind braces rising to the purlins (see photograph P.4)

Conclusion

As so often with Henley buildings, only the street frontage was updated, whilst the earlier timber framed rear range remains unchanged; in this case it seems to have happened in the first half of the C19th, when a new brick façade, new symmetrical fenestration and additional attic accommodation were achieved; the latter by raising the eaves and covering the new, shallow front roof in slates. The three false windows show that the arrangement of the existing upper rooms did not really fit the new brick façade, but it created the desired effect.

The five timber framed rear bays seem to be part of a longer back range (see 1878 map below) When William Barnaby left the building to the Town it was already over 100 years old, and let to John Cranford, according to his deed of feoffment and confirmed in his will of 1585.

The height of the rear range suggests that this was an early wing with upper chambers, originally some open to the apex. The elegant scissor brace truss may have had another partner, extending north where the staircase was later inserted. It would have formed an impressive upper chamber. Bay 3 appears to have been built as an enclosed space, accessed through a doorway and possibly a ladder stair from the fist floor of Bay 4.

Instead of the existing shallow slated roof of today above the early C19th brick facade, the original street elevation would have had a steeply pitched tiled roof, coming low down over smaller first floor windows, as it still does at the back. There would have been a passageway, giving access to the many rear service buildings and yards, as still shown on the 1878 O.S. map. Without access to its burgage plot no street front building could have functioned and before the Greys Rd. car park was built in the 1960s there was no other way of getting to the long burgage plots (see map copy below) My grateful thanks to the Municipal Charity and the owner of Facy’s for granting access for making a start with recordings parts of this fascinating building in the core of the medieval market town.

Truss E, south elevation, and profile of TRUSS E scissor brace taken at the centre of the scarf joint.

R.Gibson 2011

7 First OS Map of Henley 1878, still showing the long burgage plots running to the south boundary with Rotherfield Greys parish; this is also the bed of the Town Ditch, now running below ground.

© Ruth Gibson BA IHBC Street frontage of No 25 Market Place

3.10.2010 – 5.12.2014

Front bed bed room Attic room east west space Attic bed room east west

No 25

st 1 floor plan Attic plan

© Ruth Gibson, BA IHBC 2010, 2014, 2015

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